Universal Quantum, a University of Sussex spin-out, raises over $100m

Universal Quantum¹, a quantum computing company spun out of the University of Sussex², has raised more than $100 million from investors. The company announced the Series A round on 8 October.

It says this is the largest Series A ever raised by a quantum firm headquartered in the UK. The university says it is a record for one of its spin-outs. The company was founded by Sebastian Weidt and Winfried Hensinger of the university’s Sussex Centre for Quantum Technologies. In 2017 the two published the first practical blueprint for a large-scale trapped-ion quantum computer. Weidt is now the company’s chief executive and also holds a professorship at the university.

Trapped-ion machines use charged atoms, held in place by electric fields, as qubits. Universal Quantum builds its computers by linking many small chips together. The new money is for developing and selling that modular design, and for expansion. It is setting up its first research centre outside Europe, in Singapore, and growing in the United States, Japan and Hamburg, where it has its German hub.

DCVC, a Silicon Valley venture firm, and Firgun Ventures, a quantum-focused investor, co-led the round. Other backers include EDBI, the Singapore sovereign investor, Australian pension money through Hostplus and NGS Super, and Roblox founder Dave Baszucki.

“This round unites an extraordinary group of investors from the world’s most important pools of capital around a single mission: delivering utility-scale quantum computing,” said Weidt.

The company now has more than 100 staff at sites on three continents. The university says the company wants to help build a “Quantum Silicon Valley” in the Sussex and Brighton region.

Professor Sasha Roseneil, the university’s vice-chancellor, said the investment “has the potential to generate highly skilled, high-value jobs, to attract further investment and to strengthen the region’s reputation as a hub for quantum technology”.

The company is already working on a $77 million contract with the German Aerospace Center.